The AE Oval is a green swathe next to a deep blue sea, a neatly-trimmed field of dreams at the end of a rutted dirt road surrounded by half-finished buildings that stand as mute testament to the parlous state of the Solomon Islands.

In this deeply impoverished and recently divided nation a miracle is brewing, and out on the pitch in the Honiara suburb of Ranadi a group of 25 players and their coach, a wiry English journeyman named Alan Gillett, are preparing to deliver a fairytale.

Four times over the next 12 months, the Solomons will take on regional heavyweights Australia - first in two legs over the next five days to try and qualify for the Confederations Cup, and next year to reach the play-off stage of the World Cup. That Mark Schwarzer and Lucas Neill have turned up for tomorrow's opening encounter at the Lawson Tama Stadium speaks volumes for how seriously the Socceroos are treating their unheralded Melanesian opponents. Harry Kewell and John Aloisi have also made the trip back for the match, although they have been ruled out of the Honiara leg through injury.

With good reason. Seven years ago Australia beat the Solomons 13-0, and even goalkeeper Mark Bosnich got on the scoresheet. Four months ago the Socceroos were lucky to hang on to a 2-2 draw in Adelaide, such has been the improvement of a team fondly described as "the Brazil of the South Pacific".

There is little doubt the Solomons players are hugely skilful - a legacy of nurturing their talent in bare feet on dirt pitches or the thousands of beaches which line the 900-odd islands. But until now, individual ability had not yielded collective results. The draw in Adelaide - which allowed the Solomons to usurp New Zealand as the second-best team in Oceania - has changed all that.

A country obsessed with soccer is certainly savouring a ride the government and the Australian-backed RAMSI security forces hope will have consequences far beyond the football pitch - to help heal the wounds of a three-year insurgency and bring a fractured nation back together.

The signs are encouraging, but vestiges of rivalry remain. As the players worked through their crossing drills earlier this week, a utility truck drove past the ground several times and in the back youths waved the white flag of the Gwalese Liberation Front - a provocation to the many Solomons players who hail from the island of Malaita, which was on the other side of the civil war.

It was, though, an isolated incident in what has been an overwhelmingly positive reaction to the Solomons' success story. A population is behind its team, from all walks of life.

"Satan" is an albino "lifer" in the high-security section of Rove Prison; reportedly his crime was to decapitate a rival and hang his head in the central market. Last Sunday, when the national team players visited, he embraced them all and in a tearful voice told them they had done the whole country proud. Everywhere the team goes, from Sunday morning church services to appearances at shopping centres, prisons and the hospital, there is a sense of awe at what has been achieved.

It seems a heavy burden for a group of players who, after all, remain largely amateur and many of whom have taken leave without pay from their jobs to prepare full-time with the national team. But it is a burden they are happy to wear.

Out in the middle of the AE Oval, an early-afternoon thunderstorm may have taken the edge off the ferocious heat but still the blue training shirts drip heavy with sweat. Hard work is Gillett's modus operandi, and he doesn't like shortcuts.

"What's the matter, have you got a hairdressing appointment?" barks Gillett. "Get your head to the ball." The talk is incessant, and it's all coming from the coach. By nature Solomon Islanders are quiet and respectful, and don't like confrontation. Gillett cajoles and exhorts, and often waves his finger. "Sometimes I do cross the line, and my staff let me know," he admits.

Gillett, who cut his coaching teeth with Wimbledon's infamous Crazy Gang (Vinnie Jones and Dennis Wise among them) in the 1980s, knows this is a different type of dressing room. Coaching spells in Japan and Africa have helped mellow his approach, but he still believes players need fire in their bellies if they want to succeed.

Culturally, it is a fine line he has been walking since taking the job in May, but results and performances (the team recently came from 3-0 down to beat Singapore's Olympic side 5-4) suggest he is on the right course. Assistant coach Eddie Ngava, a native Malaitan who remains a father figure to the players, concurs.

"Alan can be tough, but the boys have learnt to respect what he says," Ngava says.

It will, therefore, be a determined, focused, and quietly-confident team that will take the park against the Socceroos, backed by a record crowd of 21,000 inside the ground, and hundreds of thousands of well-wishers around the islands who have to be content to listen to the game on radio.

Not since independence in 1978 has the Solomons felt such a surge of patriotism. Not since their last visit to the South Pacific - ironically to this same ground in 1993 - have the Socceroos been so vulnerable against Oceania opposition. This truly is the world game in all its glory.